Millennials hooked to Facebook for political news: Survey

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oi-GizBot Bureau

By Gizbot Bureau

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Published: Wednesday, June 3, 2015, 15:03 [IST]

Most of the youngsters in the US are getting their daily quota of political news from Facebook, a new survey says.

While 61 percent of millennials (those born after 1980) said they got their political news from Facebook, 37 percent said they got it from television, the survey by US think tank Pew Research Centre found.

Among the baby-boomers (those born between 1945 and 1964), 60 percent said they got their political news from local television while 39 percent said they received it from Facebook, Politico.com reported.

Twitter barely posed any competition for Facebook when it comes to political news. Just 14 percent of online millennials got political news on Twitter, slightly higher than both Gen-Xers (9 percent) and baby-boomers (5 percent).

Also, the survey found that millennials were less aware of media outlets than the other generations except for two places: BuzzFeed and Google News out of a list of 18.

Despite claiming to be less interested, millennials also see more political news on Facebook than other generations. Only 26 percent of millennials said they are interested in politics and government versus 34 percent of Gen-Xers and 45 percent of baby-boomers, the survey stated.

However, about 24 percent of millennials who use Facebook say at least half of the posts they see on the site relate to government and politics - higher than both Gen-Xers at 18 percent and baby-boomers at 16 percent.

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